This invention relates generally to combination soap holding and dispensing means, and more particularly to such means adapted for use with bar soap.
While toilet soap in bar form is no doubt by far the most common type of soap employed in households, hotels, motels, etc., the use of soap in this form has certain longstanding disadvantages which have not as yet, to my knowledge, been successfully overcome. For one thing, it is virtually impossible for a bar of soap to be completely consumed because it eventually becomes so small as to be ineffectual for further use in the normal way. The majority of persons no doubt discard the bar when it becomes this small, which results in a significant loss of soap in the long run. This wastage represents a significant item of expense, especially in a large family where there are heavy daily demands for soap for use in showers and for other bathing purposes.
Another characteristic of bar soap resulting in loss through waste is its tendency to soften when kept in conventional soap trays or the like between periods of use. This softening reduces a bar of soap to a slushy, gelatinous consistency on its underside, even, in many cases, where it is supported in such a way as to permit the drainage of moisture from the bar and the circulation of air therearound. Not only is such softening wasteful of soap, but it renders a bar less attractive in appearance and gives it a mushy, unpleasant texture and feel.
Another problem with bar soap results from its slippery surface when wet which makes the bar hard to hold onto. As a result, wet soap is often dropped, which is annoying, especially when this occurs in a shower stall. It is not uncommon for one to drop a bar of soap several times while taking a shower, making it necessary to repeatedly bend over and pick it up, often where there is scarcely space enough to permit such bending. Sometimes the bar, when dropped, will split into two or more pieces, which obviously results in more soap wastage. This is annoying enough to a person in good physical condition, but when the person is handicapped in a way to make if difficult for him to retrieve a dropped bar of soap, the dropping becomes a serious problem instead of a mere annoyance. In some cases of disability, for example, where a person is seriously afflicted with arthritis in his hands, it's hard for the disabled individual to grip a bar of soap even before it becomes slippery, and virtually impossible to hold onto the bar after it gets wet. Also, a blind person dropping a bar of soap in a shower will obviously have more of a problem than a person with good eyesight who does the same thing.
Dispensers of liquid and powdered soaps, while useful to some extent under some circumstances, are not, for the most part, suitable substitutes for bar soap. For one thing, neither type of dispenser is very effective for use in a shower. A powdered soap dispenser mounted in a shower stall is obviously so unsuitable for use in that environment that no one, to my knowledge, has ever attempted such a thing. Neither, insofar as I am aware, has there been any serious attempt to install liquid soap dispensers in showers. While liquid soaps are available in pump-type dispensers, it is awkward and inconvenient to use such a dispenser in a shower as anyone who has ever attempted to do so has discovered. Furthermore, such usage results in soap wastage because the soap is dispensed in measured amounts from such dispensers, which do not necessarily coincide with the amounts actually required. Certain handicapped persons, for example those crippled by arthritis, moreover, would find the use of liquid soap dispensers in showers (or anywhere else) difficult, if not impossible, to manage.
Thus, while bar soap has been in widespread usage throughout the world for many decades, if not centuries, it has always been plagued by the above-mentioned, and other, shortcomings which no one has heretofore, to my knowledge, succeeded in eliminating. If these shortcomings could somehow be successfully overcome, bar soap would, I believe, be in even more universal demand than it is now, particularly among handicapped persons, and, additionally, could be used with significantly less waste, hence lower cost, than it now can. Also, this would ultimately result in a savings in energy because the energy going into the manufacture of presently wasted soap would not be dissipated in the form of the unused soap.